Beloved,
We are grieving the loss of life in Minnesota following an encounter involving ICE agents and community members engaged in protest. A person is dead. Families are shattered. A community is left carrying fear and unanswered pain.
Let us be clear: the unjust and violent targeting of nonviolent protestors by ICE agents is morally wrong. It violates the dignity of human life and erodes any claim to public safety or justice.
Across faith traditions, we hold a shared truth: every life is sacred. No one should be met with lethal force for showing up, bearing witness, or standing alongside their neighbors. Protest is not a crime. Dissent is not a threat. And immigration enforcement must never come at the cost of human life.
Many of the communities ICE targets are already living under constant pressure: immigrant families, Black and brown neighborhoods, workers, elders, and children who know what it means to be watched, policed, and treated as disposable. When armed federal agents escalate situations instead of protecting life, the harm ripples far beyond a single moment.
We condemn the use of violence against civilians and protestors, and call for an end to aggressive ICE operations that terrorize communities and criminalize people who are exercising their moral and constitutional right to speak out.
As a faith-rooted, non-partisan movement, POWER Interfaith stands with those who are mourning, with those who are afraid, and with those who continue to show courage in the face of repression. Our faith demands more than just thoughts and prayers. It demands that we speak plainly, stand together, and refuse to normalize violence carried out in the name of enforcement.
To those who are hurting: we see you. We grieve with you. And we will keep showing up until our communities can live, protest, and worship without fear.
May the life lost be honored with truth. May the grieving be held with care. And may our collective conscience push us toward justice that protects life, not destroys it.
In solidarity,
Rev. Dr. Gregory Edwards
Executive Director
POWER Interfaith
